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(02/21/03 4:40am)
JERUSALEM -- Israeli soldiers shot dead two Palestinians in the West Bank on Thursday, while in the Gaza Strip troops divided the territory into three parts, restricting the movement of more than 1 million Palestinians.\nThe operations appeared to be part of Israel's stepped-up efforts against the militant Islamic group Hamas, which killed four soldiers in an attack on a tank Saturday in Gaza.\nDespite the violence, Israelis and Palestinians have been holding increased contacts on the possibility of a cease-fire, though no breakthroughs have been achieved.\nIn London, William Burns, a State Department official, met Palestinian Cabinet ministers on Wednesday to discuss a U.S.-backed peace plan that envisions the creation of a Palestinian state in about three years.\nBurns told the Palestinians that formal discussions on the plan would not resume until after Israel forms a new government, a process that could take several more weeks, and would also depend on developments in Iraq, said Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat, one of the participants.\nThe Palestinians asked the United States to send international monitors in the meantime to protect their civilians during Israeli military offensives, but Burns said Washington did not support such an idea.\nIn the West Bank city of Nablus, Israeli soldiers shot dead a 17-year-old Palestinian and wounded his grandfather as the two walked home from a nearby mosque, neighbors said. The army said the men were part of a group throwing firebombs at troops.\nTroops are conducting a massive manhunt in the city, the West Bank's largest. Israeli radio said 40 Palestinian suspects had been rounded up there since Wednesday night.\nResidents said Israeli soldiers went door-to-door through the narrow streets of the Old City looking for suspects, and called through loudspeakers for Palestinians to hand over wanted men.\nThe troops used small explosive charges to blow the locks off shops and a goldsmith's workshop was destroyed. Such shops use chemicals, including acids, that can also be used in bombmaking, and the soldiers have torn the structures down in previous raids.\nSoldiers also entered the town of Tulkarem early Thursday in an apparent search for militants and killed a 24-year-old Palestinian. The army said the man was armed, but Palestinians said he was an unarmed Hamas supporter who happened to be standing near the Palestinian wanted by Israel.\nIn the Gaza Strip, the scene of most of the recent violence, Israeli soldiers built dirt barricades, blocking Gaza's main north-south road and carving the territory into three parts.\nAs in the past, Palestinians sought to evade the barriers by traveling along a narrow strip of beachfront to reach their jobs, visit hospitals or take care of other business.\nSubhi Abu Assad, 48, was desperate to get three tons of squash to market before it went bad. His solution was to remove the squash from his truck and put it on a trailer bed, attached to a tractor, which he drove along the beach.\n"It normally takes about an hour to an hour-and-a-half to go to market and come back," he said. "We started at seven this morning and it will probably take all day."\nThe army said its operation in the Gaza Strip was in response to Palestinian rockets fired from northern Gaza at the Israeli town of Sderot on Wednesday. One Israeli was injured.\nIn southern Gaza, the army destroyed what it described as a hut used previously by Palestinian militants firing rockets at a nearby Jewish settlement. The army said no one lived there, but the Palestinians said it was home to 12 people.\nSince the attack on the Israeli tank Saturday, 29 Palestinians have been killed, including at least eight Hamas members.\nIsraeli authorities approved construction of 126 houses in Efrat, a Jewish settlement in the West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Kobi Bleich, a Housing Ministry spokesman, said there was a demand for additional homes in Efrat as the population continued to grow.\nPalestinians claim all of the West Bank and Gaza for a future state, and are seeking the removal of the nearly 150 Jewish settlements and their more than 225,000 residents.
(11/05/02 6:02am)
JERUSALEM -- In a pair of bombings Monday, a Palestinian suicide attacker killed an Israeli civilian and wounded 11 in central Israel, while two Palestinians died when a car carrying a wanted militant exploded in the West Bank.\nAgainst the backdrop of violence, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's government fended off three no-confidence votes in Israel's parliament. Sharon also rejected calls for early elections, saying it would be irresponsible. He was still searching for partners to stabilize his coalition and recapture a majority in the legislature.\nIn the 81st Palestinian suicide bombing since 2000, the assailant blew himself up in a shopping mall in Kfar Saba, a town just across the border from the West Bank Palestinian town of Qalqilyia.\n"I went into the mall and in a passageway there was the guy who blew up, in a pool of his own blood," a witness who gave his name as Ron, told Israel Radio.\nDavid Baker, an official in Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's office, said the attack was "proof that Palestinian terror knows no limits, specializes in cruelty and specifically targets the innocent."\nIslamic Jihad, the radical group that has carried out dozens of attacks in the current round of fighting, claimed responsibility for the bombing.\nIn the West Bank city of Nablus, two Palestinians were killed--one of them a wanted Hamas militant-- when their car exploded in the middle of the street.\nPalestinians immediately blamed the blast on Israel, which has carried out dozens of killings of suspected militants. It appeared the car was booby-trapped and the bomb was detonated by remote control, said Moeen Sakaran, chief of Palestinian intelligence in Nablus.\nHamad Sadder, a member of the Hamas military wing who was sought by Israel, was one of the men killed, Palestinian security sources said.\nHis nephew, Mohammed Bostami carried out last week's suicide attack in a West Bank settlement that killed three Israeli soldiers, Palestinians said. The second man was not immediately identified.\nIn the southern Gaza Strip, the Israeli army shot and killed a Palestinian man.\nIn Israel's parliament, Sharon's weakened government managed to withstand a trio of no-confidence votes brought forward by opposition parties seeking to bring down the coalition and force new elections.\nSharon said he opposed early elections, but he also insisted he would not change government policies to accommodate a far-right party whose support he needs to restore his parliamentary majority.\n"Taking the nation to immediate elections would be irresponsible," Sharon told legislators from his right-wing Likud party. "I hope everyone acts responsibly and doesn't try to make it difficult for a stable government to function."\nAfter the moderate Labor Party quit the coalition last week, Sharon has the support of only 55 of the 120 legislators. Monday's parliament session was filled with political maneuvering, but at the end of the day, virtually nothing had changed.\nSharon still needs the help of small, far-right parties to restore a parliamentary majority.\nSharon may have a temporary safety net from a far-right grouping whose seven lawmakers seem ready to prop up the government long enough to pass the 2003 state budget in coming weeks, but after that may favor forcing early elections.\nNegotiators from the group, the National Union-Israel Beiteinu, presented Sharon with tough terms for joining his coalition: that he formally cancel Israel's commitment to the 1990s interim peace accords with the PLO and declare the Palestinian Authority those agreements established a terrorist entity.\n"This is a good opportunity to change the government's policies," said Avigdor Lieberman, a lawmaker from the party. "If (Sharon) won't change the basic policies and he won't change anything...why should we join the government?"\nSharon has said elections should be held as scheduled, in October 2003.\nIn another development Monday, parliament approved Shaul Mofaz, the recently retired military chief, as the new defense minister.\nMofaz, known for his hawkish views, had angered Palestinians with his tough policies and supported exiling Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.\nAlthough Sharon has boycotted and sought to marginalize Arafat, he has refrained from expelling the Palestinian leader, heeding adviser's warnings that the move would anger the United States and severely inflame passions in the region.
(11/04/02 4:43am)
JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Ariel Sharon sought to keep his imperiled government afloat Sunday by bringing former premier Benjamin Netanyahu into the Cabinet, while Netanyahu set a tough condition for joining -- early elections. \nIsrael's two leading right-wing politicians, Sharon and Netanyahu, are trying to work out an alliance while also battling each other to lead the Likud Party into the country's next general election. \nThe ballot must be held before next November, but could be brought forward to early next year if Sharon resigns or if his fragile coalition collapses in the coming days or weeks. That could plunge Israel into even greater turmoil as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict drags on and with the threat of a U.S. war with Iraq on the horizon. \nIn the complex rivalry between Sharon and Netanyahu, both stressed their efforts to resolve the current political crisis, and played down any suggestion they were jockeying for advantage in the next election. \n"I told (Sharon) that I'll be happy to serve as foreign minister on condition that we go to early elections,'' Netanyahu told Israeli television. "The right thing is to immediately go to new elections,'' he added, predicting that Likud would double its current 19 seats in the 120-member parliament. \nSharon wants Netanyahu in the government, a development that could help stabilize the coalition. In addition, Netanyahu would presumably be subject to the discipline of Cabinet decisions, rather than having the freedom to criticize the government from the outside. \nSharon "praised the decision in principle by Mr. Netanyahu to join his government,'' the prime minister's office said in a statement. Netanyahu's demand for early elections was "being examined,'' Sharon's office added. \nNetanyahu could harm his image if he flatly refused to join the government at a moment of crisis. But analysts said he is reluctant to serve under Sharon as the race for party leader intensifies. \nSharon is the current Likud leader, but a party primary must be held before the next general election. \nSome polls have shown Netanyahu winning a head-to-head contest. He would then be positioned to become the next prime minister, according to the polls that show Likud winning the largest number seats in the next election. \nIn Israel's chronically unstable political system, the winner of any election will have to work out alliances with a host of smaller parties. Such governments regularly fall, and the country has had five prime ministers in the past seven years. \nSharon's broad-based coalition government lost its majority in parliament last week when the moderate Labor Party, the largest single faction, quit over a dispute about funding to Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. \nThe coalition now has 55 seats in the 120-seat parliament, making the government vulnerable to collapse. Several no-confidence motions are expected in parliament in the coming days. \nSharon and his aides are looking to form an alliance with the far-right National Union-Israel Beiteinu party, which has seven seats, enough to give the government a narrow majority. \nNational Union leaders met Sunday with Sharon's Cabinet Secretary Gideon Saar to discuss joining the government. No decision was reached, but more talks were planned. \nSharon has said he will not alter his policies in order to bring in additional parties, but the National Union says it wants to see the government move further to the right in its handling of the conflict with the Palestinians. \n"We want a significant change in the policies of the government,'' said Yuri Stern, a National Union lawmaker participating in the negotiations. \nThe National Union opposes the creation of a Palestinian state and wants Yasser Arafat removed as the Palestinian leader, said Benny Elon, a National Union lawmaker. \nSuch hard-line coalition partners could put Sharon in a bind as he responds to a U.S.-led plan that seeks to establish a Palestinian state with provisional borders by next year. \nWhen Netanyahu was prime minister from 1996-99, Sharon served as foreign minister for the latter part of that tenure. Despite their occasional alliances, the two men are better known as rivals. \nWhen Netanyahu was premier, longtime hawk Sharon was considered to be pulling him to the right. \nBut the two have traded places and for most of Sharon's tenure over the past 20 months. Netanyahu has criticized him for not expelling Arafat and for accepting in principle the idea of Palestinian statehood. \nIn another development Sunday, Israeli officials said troops shot an armed Palestinian in an Israeli-controlled area near the Gaza Strip town of Rafah, near the Egyptian border. Further details were not immediately available. \nArmy officials also said troops opened fire at three Palestinians who approached the Gaza border with Israel, but said the area wouldn't be searched until daybreak for fear of booby traps.
(08/01/02 1:36am)
JERUSALEM -- A bomb hidden in a bag ripped through a busy cafeteria at Hebrew University, killing seven people Wednesday as it shattered the academic peace and left behind pools of blood in one of the few places where young Jews and Arabs still mixed freely.\nMore than 70 people were wounded in the bombing, the second to hit Jerusalem in two days.\nThe U.S. Embassy confirmed that one of the dead was an American citizen. Jehuda Hiss, head of the Israeli forensic medicine center, told The Associated Press the determination was based on identification papers, but declined to release the name. Details about the nationalities of the other casualties were not immediately available.\nSheikh Ahmed Yassin, spiritual leader of the militant Hamas group, linked the attack to Israel's air raid last week on Gaza City that killed the organization's military chief and 14 civilians, including nine children. Other Hamas leaders told AP the group had not issued a formal claim of responsibility but praised the attack as revenge for the Gaza airstrike.\nIsrael has tried to end Palestinian attacks by sending troops to impose a curfew in most West Bank cities and towns for the past six weeks. After a lull, there's been an outbreak of shootings and bombings in the past week.\nIsrael's Security Cabinet, meeting after Wednesday's blast, decided Israel would retaliate within hours, Israel Radio said. The report could not be independently confirmed.\nPresident Bush condemned the attack "in the strongest possible terms," and said it was perpetrated by "killers who hate the thought of peace."\nLike other deadly attacks in the past, the bombing coincided with a review of U.S. peacemaking prospects -- this time with King Abdullah of Jordan, whose country has a peace treaty with Israel.\nIn two days of talks beginning Thursday, the monarch hopes to persuade the Bush administration to step up its timetable for Palestinian statehood and for Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza.\nU.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan condemned the bombing and again urged Israelis and Palestinians "to end the cycle of violence, revenge and retaliation."\nThe lunchtime blast in the university's Frank Sinatra International Student Center struck a popular student hangout at a school that's been an island of tolerance throughout the nearly two years of Mideast fighting.\nAlastair Goldrein, 19, from Liverpool, England, said the cafeteria was a gathering place for students of all backgrounds.\n"I was on my way to lunch. There was a huge, huge explosion. Everything shook and then there was this deathly silence," said Goldrein, who has been taking courses in Jewish studies for the past year. "I ran in, there were people lying around wailing, covered in blood. Scenes that are indescribable, clothes and flesh torn apart."\nThe bag with the bomb was placed on a table in the center of the cafeteria, police said. "It was not a suicide bomber," said police spokeswoman Sigal Toledo. The blast brought down part of the ceiling and blew out windows.\nThe explosion occurred at the university's Mount Scopus campus, a Jewish enclave surrounded by Palestinian neighborhoods in the eastern part of the city. The student center was named for Sinatra, who attended the 1978 dedication of the building.\n Money for the student center was raised by members of the Friends of Hebrew University from the west coast of the United States, many of whom had connections in the entertainment industry.\nPolice maintain heavy security at the university, with student backpacks checked thoroughly by guards at entrances, students said.\n However, Benny Vered, deputy editor of the school newspaper, said the perimeter fence was easy to cross. In April, the newspaper predicted such an attack, he told Israel Radio.\n"I held a sign that said 'terrorist' and crossed back and forth over the fence for 40 minutes," he said, adding that no one stopped him or even appeared to notice.\nThe university said 23,000 students attend the school, about 5,000 of them Arabs and 1,500 from abroad.\nShortly before Wednesday's attack, the Rev. Jesse Jackson met Yasser Arafat at the Palestinian leader's West Bank headquarters in Ramallah. Palestinian authorities were "continuing our efforts, and will continue, from every aspect, to stop the violence," Arafat said at a joint news conference.\nJackson was to go to Gaza to meet Yassin, the Hamas spiritual leader, but canceled after the bombing. In a statement, Jackson said he called off the meeting "to show proper respect for the victims" of the attack. He said the bombings are "horribly merciless" and "will not help move toward establishing a Palestinian state."\nYassin, in linking the bombing to the Gaza airstrike last week, said Israel should have expected a revenge attack.\n"When Israel bombs a civilian building full of women and children, and kills 15 people this is the response they should expect," he said.\nThe Palestinian Authority said in a statement that it "absolutely condemns the attack against Hebrew University." However, the Palestinian leadership also said it "considers Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon responsible for this cycle of terror."\nSharon's government has slightly eased the tough restrictions placed on Palestinian movements, but the latest attacks could lead to even tougher measures.\n"Israel is fighting a pitched battle against terror, and for the right to walk down the street, take a bus or sit in a cafeteria without the fear of being decimated by Palestinian terrorism," said David Baker of the prime minister's office.\nOn Tuesday, a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up at a fast-food stand in Jerusalem, wounding several Israelis.\nAfter withholding tax revenues from the Palestinians for much of the past 22 months, Israel on Wednesday transferred $15 million to the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority.\nIsrael had withheld an estimated $600 million in tax money since shortly after the fighting erupted in September 2000. Aid groups say the number of undernourished Palestinian children has risen sharply. Palestinian unemployment is rampant.
(07/25/02 8:23pm)
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- After four weeks of U.S. attacks, Afghanistan's ruling Taliban are no longer "functioning as a government," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Sunday. But an opposition attack on a key northern city was reported faltering only hours after it was launched. \nThat raised doubts whether the factious, poorly armed northern alliance opposition could exploit U.S. airstrikes and topple the Taliban without the assistance of American ground troops. \nMeanwhile, U.S. jets struck the front line about 30 miles north of Kabul, according to Atiqullah Baryalai, deputy defense minister of the northern alliance. In the Afghan capital itself, American bombs hit near the Intercontinental Hotel, set on a hill in the southwest part of the city. \nThey also struck the northeast town of Taloqan, which the opposition lost to the Taliban last year. \nRumsfeld, on a tour of front line states in the war against terrorism, sought to dispel fears that the air campaign, now in its fifth week, was failing to crack the Taliban's grip on Afghanistan. \n"The Taliban (are) not really functioning as a government," Rumsfeld declared after meeting Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, a key Muslim ally in the anti-terrorism campaign. \nRumsfeld, who later Sunday went on to India, said the Taliban were "using their power in enclaves throughout the country" and were "not making major military moves." \n"They are pretty much in static positions," he said. Rumsfeld said the Islamic militia was using mosques as command centers and as ammunition storage sites to spare them from American attack and "actively lying about civilian casualties." \nEarlier Sunday, in Uzbekistan, Rumsfeld gave an assessment of the military campaign's success to date. "The effort to deal with the problem of terrorist networks is proceeding," Rumsfeld said. "It is, we believe, proceeding at a pace that is showing measurable progress." \nA key element of the U.S. strategy has been to attack Taliban positions facing the northern alliance, especially on the front north of Kabul and on positions defending the Taliban-held city of Mazar-e-Sharif. \nOn Sunday, opposition spokesman Nadeem Ashraf said alliance forces launched a three-pronged offensive south of Mazar-e-Sharif in strategic Kishanday district in Balkh province, which borders Uzbekistan. The spokesman said the attack began after U.S. jets softened up Taliban positions by heavy bombing. \nHours later, however, Ashraf said one of the three opposition columns, led by Uzbek warlord Rashid Dostum, was making no progress and the offensive was faltering. He said Dostum's forces numbered only about 700 to 1,000 fighters and had "no high morale." \nHis assessment could not be independently confirmed. However, it points to ethnic rivalries within the northern alliance that have long hampered the opposition's ability to mount an effective challenge to the Taliban. \nThe other troops in the Mazar-e-Sharif front are commanded by a close ally of the northern alliance's titular leader, former Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani, and by Shiite Muslim warlord Mohammed Mohaqik. \nOpposition commanders around the other major front, north of Kabul, have said they are preparing for a major offensive toward the capital after days of heavy U.S. airstrikes. However, there have been few signs that a major push toward Kabul is in the offing. \nPresident Bush ordered the airstrikes Oct. 7 after the Taliban repeatedly refused to surrender Osama bin Laden, chief suspect in the September terrorist attacks that killed about 4,500 people in the United States. \nDuring the past week, U.S. attacks have shifted from cities to Taliban positions facing the northern alliance. But opposition forces are poorly armed and outgunned, and the approach of winter is making resupply of its front-line positions more difficult. \nIn Washington, Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, acknowledged that the U.S. military is "settling in for the long haul." \nThe Taliban "have a substantial force left, but at this point that's exactly what we expected," Myers said on NBC's "Meet the Press." \nHe said a couple more teams of special forces were placed in Afghanistan in the last day or so to work with opposition leaders and better coordinate airstrikes. \nMyers and Army Gen. Tommy Franks, commander of U.S. forces in the war, declined to say whether it would take a major deployment of U.S. ground troops to topple the Taliban. \nAppearing on ABC's "This Week," Franks was asked whether he would rule out the use of a large number of ground forces. "Absolutely not," he replied. \nIn Pakistan, Rumsfeld addressed the issue of a pause in the bombing campaign during the Islamic holy month Ramadan, which begins around Nov. 17. Bush has ruled out any pause, despite appeals from Musharraf and other Muslim allies. \n"The reality is that the threat of additional terrorist acts is there," Rumsfeld told reporters. The United States will be sensitive to the views in the region, he added, but he declined to outline the U.S. military plans. \nIn other developments: \n• The U.N. special envoy for Afghanistan brought his search for a broad-based government for Afghanistan to Iran on Sunday, where he met with Afghan exiles. \n• In London, British Prime Minister Tony Blair scheduled a meeting with key European leaders Sunday to discuss the war on terrorism, his office said. Blair was also expected to brief allies on his efforts to shore up Muslim support for the campaign.
(07/25/02 8:23pm)
RAMALLAH, West Bank -- Saying Israel is in a war for survival, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon vowed to "smash" Palestinian militants in an uncompromising offensive, as he addressed a nation rattled by five suicide bombings in five days, including two attacks Sunday that killed 14 Israelis. \nIn a sign that Israel's "Operation Protective Wall" was expanding, dozens of Israeli tanks entered the West Bank town of Qalqiliya late Sunday, Palestinian witnesses said. Armored vehicles also amassed near biblical Bethlehem. \nIn Ramallah, under Israeli control since Friday, dozens of European peace activists, their arms raised and holding white flags, marched past bewildered Israeli soldiers into Yasser Arafat's office to protest the confinement of the Palestinian leader by Israel. The protesters said they would stay with Arafat, who has accused Israel of trying to kill him, as a human shield. \nEarlier in the day, Israeli forces surrounding the building exchanged fire with Arafat's guards, and Palestinian officials said Arafat was just a few yards from the fighting. Several guards were wounded, two of them seriously. At least 13 Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers have been killed in Ramallah since Friday. \nThe Israeli army spokesman, Brig. Gen. Ron Kitrey, acknowledged that Arafat was at risk, even if he was not a target. \nAddressing the nation in a five-minute televised speech, Sharon said Israel is fighting a "war over our home" and branded Arafat an enemy of the Jewish state and the "entire free world," as well as a danger to the Middle East. \n"We must fight against this terrorism, fight with no compromise, pull up these wild plants by the roots, smash their infrastructure, because there is no compromise with terrorism," Sharon said, adding that only then a cease-fire would be possible. \nPalestinian Cabinet Minister Saeb Erekat said the speech was "void of substance, void of hope, void of realism." Erekat said Sharon "slammed the door tonight in the face of all of those who are trying to de-escalate." \nThe Cabinet met Sunday to review plans for the next stage of the offensive, for which 20,000 reserve soldiers were mobilized, at a cost of millions of dollars a month. Still, some expressed unease over what they called the campaign's vague goals. The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange dropped by five percent points Sunday, and the dollar rose 2.8 percent against the shekel. \nSome newspaper commentaries said the military campaign was mainly driven by Sharon's need to settle a personal score with Arafat, who in 1982 was besieged by Sharon's forces in Beirut, but was able to leave Lebanon with thousands of fighters. \n"This explains Sharon's tremendous urge to humiliate Arafat," Nahum Barnea wrote in the Yediot Ahronot Daily. \nIn the first of Sunday's two suicide blasts, a Palestinian from the Islamic militant group Hamas blew himself up in a restaurant, killing himself and 14 diners, and wounding more than 40. \nThe blast tore away much of the roof and shattered tables and windows. Twisted piles of metal covered the floor. "Even the moderately injured were on fire," said a witness, Shimon Sabag, who helped administer first aid. \nTwo hours later, a suicide bomber walked into a paramedics' dispatch station in the Jewish settlement of Efrat in the West Bank and detonated his explosives. The attacker died and four medics were wounded, including a trainee who was in serious condition. \nPresident Bush, who has defended Israel's offensive, condemned Sunday's bombings and said they would not "deter him from the pursuit of peace," White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said. \nSharon's pledge to press on with the offensive came despite a U.N. Security Council resolution calling on Israel to withdraw from Palestinian territory. \nIsrael's ambassador to the United Nations said U.S. officials have suggested to Israel that it would not have to act immediately on the resolution because there's no timeline. "Everyone is aware of this, including the Americans," the ambassador, Yehuda Lancry, told Israel Army Radio.
(06/24/02 2:20am)
JERUSALEM -- Israeli troops are keeping at least 400,000 Palestinians under effective house arrest with round-the-clock curfews and largely barring the media from covering its escalating invasion of the West Bank -- an operation that has faced minimal Palestinian resistance and limited international criticism.\nThe army began "Operation Determined Path" last week, after two suicide bombings in Jerusalem killed 26 Israelis. An earlier wave of Palestinian attacks set off a similar six-week sweep through the West Bank in late March.\nBut unlike that first extended foray, when Israeli troops encountered heavy fire in several towns and besieged the office of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, the new operation has been comparatively low-key. Troops have steadily moved into the Palestinian areas, but without the fanfare or the firefights.\nThe one exception was Qalqiliya, where two Israeli soldiers were killed in a gun battle as soldiers entered the town Wednesday evening. The troops pulled out, only to re-enter Sunday morning without resistance.\nThe lack of prolonged gunbattles and extensive aerial bombardments as well as daily pictures of devastation has muted Arab and European criticism this time, in contrast to Israel's last occupation. Key Arab leaders also have been working with Washington and likely will remain quiet at least until after they've heard President Bush's widely anticipated policy proposal on the Mideast crisis.\nDuring the last incursion, Israeli forces went house-to-house searching for suspected militants and carried out mass arrests of Palestinian men.\nIn the latest drive into the West Bank the tanks and armored personnel carriers have parked in the deserted streets, and for the most part, have just remained there. The significant exception was the northern West Bank town of Jenin, where many hundreds were rounded up late last week.\n"We have no choice but take these measures to stop suicide bombers from killing our women, children, and sometimes babies," Israeli government spokesman Danny Naveh said Sunday. "The Palestinian population is suffering, I can acknowledge that as well. We need to put an end to this suffering -- in both communities."\nOne reason for the relative absence of resistance this time is that more than 200 Palestinians, many of them militants, were killed and 1,000 arrested in the first round.\nIsrael says it must track down suicide bombers because the Palestinian security forces are unable or unwilling to do it. However, the first sweep did not stop the bombings for long.\nThis time around, Israeli troops are using curfews more, in terms of both extent and duration.\nIsraeli troops have imposed round-the-clock curfews on the five Palestinian cities and towns they control -- Bethlehem, Nablus, Jenin, Tulkarem and Qalqiliya -- as well as a suburb of Ramallah.\nAbout 400,000 Palestinians live in these cities and towns, and they cannot leave their houses to go to work, to school or to shop. The only exceptions are medical emergencies.\nTypically, the curfew is lifted for about three hours every third day, during which residents rush to the market to stock up on food.\nPalestinians say Israel's goal is clear -- to destroy the Palestinian Authority and replace it with Israeli rule, as was the case before the two sides signed the breakthrough 1993 Oslo Accords.\nThe Israelis "are continuing the destruction of the Palestinian Authority and Palestinian institutions," said Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator. "We will end up with Israel fully resuming the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, fully replacing the Palestinian Authority, with the Israeli civil administration and military government"
(04/11/02 6:29am)
ENIN, West Bank -- From a West Bank army base overlooking the scene of the deadliest fighting in Israel's 13-day-old offensive, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Wednesday delivered a blunt message: Israel will not pull back until Palestinian militias are crushed.\nDespite his pledge to continue the offensive in the face of intense U.S. and international pressure to call it off, Sharon's defense ministry announced late Wednesday troops were pulling out of West Bank villages of Yatta, Qabatya and Samua.\nThen early Thursday, Israeli forces and tanks rolled into the central West Bank town of Ber Zeit -- north of the commercial center of Ramallah -- and troops quickly occupied the police station and began doing house-to-house searches, witnesses said. The soldiers met no resistance, they said.\nYatta and Samua are near the southern city of Hebron, and Qabatya is near the northern city of Jenin, where some of the most fierce fighting has been reported.\nThe White House supported the withdrawal and said the Palestinians should respond.\n"The burden isn't Israel's alone. All parties have responsibilities," spokesman Ari Fleischer said.\nAlso Wednesday night, Israeli soldiers killed two Palestinians armed with grenades and Kalashnikov rifles near the Kisufim crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip, the military said.\nSharon's statement earlier Wednesday defied increasingly impatient U.S. demands for a withdrawal from Palestinian towns -- to be delivered in person Friday by Secretary of State Colin Powell -- and came hours after an Islamic militant blew himself up on a bus in northern Israel, killing himself and eight passengers.\nSpeaking to cheering soldiers at a post overlooking the battered Jenin refugee camp, Sharon said he explained to President Bush that "we are in the middle of a battle" which, if abandoned prematurely, would only require another round of fighting later on.\n"Once we finish, we are not going to stay here," the former general said. "But first we have to accomplish our mission." He added that unless Israel crushed the militants, the phenomenon of suicide bombings "could spread like a plague around the world."\nEarlier in the day, Israel's Security Cabinet affirmed the decision to continue the offensive. By nightfall, resistance was subdued in the Jenin camp -- where fighting has raged for days and where 13 Israeli soldiers were killed Tuesday in a sophisticated Palestinian ambush -- and in the old town of Nablus, the largest West bank city.\nPowell insisted his peacekeeping mission was not threatened by Sharon's refusal to halt the incursions. "My mission is not in the least in jeopardy," he told reporters in Spain.\nSharon has branded Arafat the leader of a "regime of terror" and has suggested he would no longer do business with him. However, Powell reiterated Wednesday that the United States would continue dealing with Arafat.\nPalestinian Parliament Speaker Ahmed Qureia said the Palestinians would demand that Powell secure an immediate Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian areas and that U.S. mediators come up with a timetable for carrying out a cease-fire.\nIsrael withdrew from two Palestinian towns earlier this week, but its forces remained in four others.\nIn the Jenin refugee camp, dozens of gunmen holed up in a small area fired sporadically Wednesday morning at Israeli troops advancing with bulldozers. A local leader of the militant group Hamas, Jamal Abdel Salam, quoted one gunman as telling him by phone: "We are in a group inside a house. They (the Israelis) are at the door and they are coming to arrest us. Take care of my family."\nLater Wednesday, about 300 camp residents, including armed men, women and children, surrendered to Israeli troops. An Associated Press photographer driving through the camp saw many building facades with wreckingball-sized holes from Israeli shelling. Streets were deserted, and there was no sign of Palestinian resistance.\nMore than 100 Palestinians are believed to have been killed in the Jenin camp, and many bodies remain in the streets. Among those reported dead was Mahmoud Tawalbeh, a 23-year-old leader of the militant Islamic Jihad group who masterminded a number of suicide bombings.\nIn Nablus, rescue workers on Wednesday retrieved the bodies of 14 Palestinians, bringing the total of dead in the city since the start of the Israeli invasion to 60. The old city of Nablus, a warren of narrow alleys, had been the scene of fierce battles for days.\nAnd in Bethlehem, a standoff continued at one of Christianity's holiest sites, the Church of the Nativity. An Armenian monk in the compound was seriously wounded, and Israeli troops and armed Palestinians blamed each other for the shooting.\nIsrael's Security Cabinet on Wednesday repeated its earlier position -- that the siege will continue until the gunmen surrender. The Palestinian Authority has not commented on the plan.
(04/10/02 5:41am)
JENIN, West Bank -- Palestinians ambushed Israeli troops in the cramped quarters of a West Bank refugee camp Tuesday, setting off a suicide bomb trap in a narrow alley and firing on soldiers in a courtyard, the military said. Thirteen Israelis were killed, the biggest blow to the army in its West Bank offensive. \nThe carefully planned double attack in the Jenin refugee camp also wounded nine Israeli soldiers. A military spokesman said a rapid series of blasts went off in the alley -- one of them detonated by a suicide bomber -- and collapsed part of a building on several soldiers. \nDefying U.S. demands that Israel's 12-day-old campaign wrap up without delay, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon vowed "Operation Defensive Shield" will go on until it fulfills its mission -- "the destruction of the infrastructure of the terror groups." \n"This is a battle for survival of the Jewish people, for survival of the state of Israel," Sharon said on Israel TV. \nThere were signs, however, that U.S. efforts were having an effect. Earlier Tuesday, Israel pulled out of Tulkarem and Qalqiliya, two of six Palestinian towns it has occupied; troops remained in Nablus, Bethlehem, Jenin and Ramallah and several villages. \nSecretary of State Colin Powell, due to arrive in Israel late Thursday, said he was optimistic his mission could bring a truce and lead to negotiations. Speaking in Cairo, Powell said he would meet Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat as well as Sharon and said the United States was willing to deploy observers to monitor any cease-fire. \nIsrael had said it would keep Arafat isolated in the Ramallah offices where he has been confined by troops since the West Bank campaign began. But Israeli officials said Tuesday they would not prevent Powell from meeting the Palestinian leader. \nIsrael launched its offensive March 29 to crush militias after a series of Palestinian suicide bombings. At least 124 Palestinians and 25 Israeli soldiers have been confirmed killed during the incursion, according to Palestinian medics and the Israeli army. The toll was expected to rise; there were reports that dead Palestinians had not been brought out of some areas, especially in the Jenin camp. \nThe Jenin camp in the northern West Bank, home to more than 13,000 Palestinians, has been the site of the most intense fighting of the Israeli assault, with gunmen inside battling Israeli soldiers for the past week. All but three of Israel's casualties in the campaign have occurred in the camp. \nBy Tuesday, several hundred gunmen had been pushed into a small area of the camp, with Israeli helicopter gunships providing heavy cover fire for ground troops, witnesses said. \nCamp resident Jamal Abdel Salam, an activist in the Islamic militant Hamas group, said the gunmen told him "they said they prefer death to surrender." \nIn the double ambush, one group of soldiers was walking in a narrow alley when the bombs went off, military spokesman Brig. Gen. Ron Kitrey said. One of the blasts was set off by a Palestinian who blew himself up, while the other explosives were wired together, he said, killing several soldiers and bringing a house down on three of them. \nJust a few yards away, Israeli soldiers who had entered the courtyard of a house came under heavy fire from Palestinian gunmen on rooftops, and several more soldiers were killed, Kitrey told The Associated Press. The wounded and three bodies were recovered. \nThe Association for Civil Rights in Israel said dozens of bodies of Palestinians were piled in the streets of Jenin camp, and residents were prevented from getting food and water. The Israeli organization complained to the Defense Ministry that the military has committed serious human rights violations in the camp, including the demolition of homes with residents still inside. There was no immediate response from the Defense Ministry. \nIn Nablus, the West Bank's largest city, troops took control of the densely populated downtown area, or casbah, after several days of fierce resistance by Palestinian gunmen. At least 41 Palestinians were killed in the fighting there, but the toll was not final because bodies remained in the streets, medics said. \nIsraeli forces also raided the small town of Dura, south of Hebron, leveling two Palestinian intelligence and security compounds and rounding up men for questioning, Palestinian security officials said. Two Palestinians were killed in exchanges of fire with Israeli forces, the officials said. \nMeanwhile, a standoff at Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity, built over the traditional birthplace of Jesus, entered its second week, straining delicate relations between Israel and the Vatican. More than 200 armed Palestinians have been holed up in the shrine, ringed by Israeli troops. An Israeli army officer said that negotiations were under way and that one proposal was to have the gunmen surrender to a third party. \nChristian leaders called on Israel to leave Bethlehem after a gunbattle and fire erupted Monday around the church. Some church officials, including a Franciscan friar, angrily accused Israel of provoking the unprecedented violence around the shrine. Sharon said Israel would not lift the siege until the armed men have surrendered. \nIsraeli officials said the decision was made to pull out of Qalqiliya and Tulkarem -- which remained encircled by Israeli troops -- after President Bush sharply called on Israel to end its offensive. Powell said he hoped the withdrawal early Tuesday was "the beginning of the end" of the spiraling violence. \nBut Sharon's comments suggested an end would not come quickly. Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said the West Bank assault has "dealt a heavy blow to the terrorist infrastructure." \nThe army says it detained 1,600 Palestinians -- of whom 84 were wanted suspects -- and seized more than 1,300 assault rifles, 387 sniper rifles, 49 anti-tank grenades, 256 machine guns, 58 bombs and 65 pounds of explosives. It also says it found 11 explosives laboratories. \nHowever, Palestinian officials said the bruising assault has also battered the Palestinian security apparatus which Israel holds responsible for controlling radical groups. \n"The Israeli occupation forces have destroyed everything related to the Palestinian security services (and) have arrested the Palestinian policemen and security personnel," said Parliament Speaker Ahmed Qureia.
(03/05/02 5:54am)
RAMALLAH, West Bank -- Israel sent warplanes and tanks against Palestinian targets Monday, killing the wife and three children of a Hamas militant in what the military said was a mistake. In all, 16 Palestinians died in retaliatory raids. \nThe multiple strikes in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip followed a Cabinet decision Sunday to intensify military action after Israel was left reeling from Palestinian bombing and shooting attacks that killed 22 Israelis over the weekend. \nAfter nightfall, Israeli F-16 warplanes bombed Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's headquarters compound in Bethlehem, Palestinian officials said. There were no reports of casualties. The building had been evacuated for days in expectation of an Israeli attack. \nWitnesses said the warplanes set two security buildings on fire. Palestinian security official Ahmed Abdel Rahman condemned the attack, calling it "dangerous escalation." \nThe Israeli military said the attacks were a "response to murderous attacks of the past few days." \n"We are in a war over our home and the war is horrible," Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told parliament, vowing Israel will not succumb to what he has described as a relentless campaign of Palestinian terror. \n"I am sure in the end that we will win and peace will come to this home," he said. \nSharon said the Palestinians must absorb punishment to learn that terrorism does not pay. \nThe past week has seen some of the worst violence in the 17 months of Mideast fighting, with repeated international efforts failing to end the bloodshed and each side claiming they had no choice but to hit back at the other. \n"The response will be hard, and the Zionist enemy will understand that it is going to pay a high price," Sheik Ahmed Yassin, spiritual leader of the militant Islamic movement Hamas, said Monday. \nThe Palestinian Authority demanded immediate international intervention to stop "this barbaric Israeli aggression against our people and our land." \nIn the deadliest episode, an Israeli tank shell fired from long distance slammed into a pickup truck, killing the wife of a Hamas militant and the couple's three children, 8, 14 and 17. \nHussein Abu Kweik's wife had just picked up the children from school and was driving in a well-to-do neighborhood of Ramallah when the shell turned the vehicle into a mangled piece of steel. \nA second car, passing in the opposite direction, was hit by shrapnel, killing two youngsters, ages 4 and 16. \nAbu Kweik, who was not in the pickup, vowed to avenge the deaths. \n"I swear to God they will pay a very high price for this crime," said Abu Kweik. "We will continue our resistance until it's the end of the last (Israeli) soldier on our lands." \nAbu Kweik is a local leader with Hamas, which has carried out many of the 40 suicide bombings against Israelis during the current conflict. \nThe Israeli military said the tank shell was aimed at a car carrying armed Palestinian policemen and hit the truck by mistake. Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer expressed "regret at the loss of life of Palestinian civilians." \nIsrael has killed dozens of suspected Palestinian militants in targeted attacks, but army spokesman Brig. Gen. Ron Kitrey said Abu Kweik was not a target. \nIsraeli troops also staged two new raids into refugee camps. \nIn the Jenin camp in the West Bank, six Palestinians were killed and 20 wounded in fierce shootouts, witnesses and hospital officials said. \nDr. Khalil Suleiman, who was overseeing rescue efforts from an ambulance, was killed and three colleagues were wounded when the ambulance was hit by an Israeli tank shell, Red Crescent officials said. The driver said an oxygen canister exploded inside the vehicle. \nThe Israeli army said the ambulance approached a checkpoint at high speed, and that soldiers used "light weapons fire," fearing the vehicle was trying to run them down. \nThe army has said ambulances are being used to smuggle weapons and gunmen; Palestinians say soldiers fire indiscriminately at rescue vehicles. \nTroops exchanged fire with men in the Rafah refugee camp in Gaza on the border with Egypt, killing two armed Palestinians and a civilian, doctors said. The Israeli military said troops searched for tunnels used to smuggle arms under the border. \nAlso Monday, Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian man who ran toward an Israeli army checkpoint near the West Bank town of Nablus, the army said. \nCasualties soared over the past week, when Israel raided two West Bank refugee camps in an attempt to break up militant strongholds, killing 23 Palestinians in retaliations for Palestinian attacks. \nThe Al Aqsa Brigades, a militia linked to Arafat's Fatah movement, struck back with two attacks -- a suicide bombing in ultra-Orthodox religious neighborhood of Jerusalem, and a sniper attack in the West Bank. \nIn 17 months of fighting 1,043 people have died on the Palestinian side and 312 on the Israeli side.
(02/13/02 4:15am)
JERUSALEM -- Foreign Minister Shimon Peres outlined a peace plan Tuesday negotiated with a senior Palestinian lawmaker that calls for a cease-fire followed quickly by the establishment of a Palestinian state. \nLong on optimism but short on supporters, the plan was reached between Peres and Palestinian parliament speaker Ahmed Qureia, known as Abu Ala, over several months of unannounced meetings in which they strove to move beyond the daily violence and heated rhetoric. \nMeanwhile, Palestinians fired two Qassam-2 rockets at a Jewish settlement in the West Bank Tuesday but missed, said a senior Israeli security source, speaking on condition of anonymity. It would be the first such firing in the West Bank. \nA homemade rocket, the Qassam-2 has a range of three to five miles, enough to hit Israeli towns from the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In the past, the Islamic militant group Hamas has fired several shorter-range Qassam-1 rockets that caused no damage. \nIsrael's Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer warned Tuesday that he might send troops to retake some Palestinian areas for extended periods if Palestinian militants fire more Qassam-2 rockets. \nTwo Qassam-2 rockets fired by Hamas from Gaza landed Sunday in open fields in southern Israel, causing no injuries. Israel responded with airstrikes in Gaza City Sunday and Monday. \n"The Qassam is something that crosses all our red lines" because of its range, Ben-Eliezer told reporters during a tour of northern Israel. \n Tension is rising between Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and West Bank security chief Jibril Rajoub, said a Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity. He said the two had a heated disagreement when Arafat accused Rajoub of failing to prevent the release of militants from Palestinian prisons. \nMarwan Barghouti, West Bank leader of Arafat's Fatah movement, told Israel TV that all the militants should be released because "they are resisting the (Israeli) occupation." Barghouti said that the conflict with Israel must be ended. \n"There has to be a political plan that gives real hope to the Palestinian people," he said. \nIn their peace efforts, Peres and Qureia appeared to have reached broad agreement on several important points, but it remained far from clear how much support their plan would generate among Israeli and Palestinian leaders. \nPeres suggested the plan was also backed by Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. \n"There is a proposal, which is acceptable to Abu Ala and his senders," Peres said on Israel radio, adding that he has shown the plan to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and expects his comments. \nPeres may face a tough battle persuading Sharon, who has shot down several of his initiatives. Other members of Sharon's coalition government -- including members of Peres' own Labor Party -- also are skeptical.
(01/28/02 5:16am)
JERUSALEM -- For the first time, a Palestinian woman launched a bomb attack Sunday, killing herself and an 81-year-old Israeli man and wounding at least a dozen people on a busy Jerusalem street. \nIsraeli police said they were not sure if the woman intended to kill herself or if the bomb exploded prematurely as she walked along Jaffa Street, the main commercial strip in west Jerusalem. \nIn Lebanon, the Al-Manar television station run by the militant Hezbollah movement said the bomber was Shinaz Amuri, a female student at Al-Najah University in the West Bank town of Nablus. \nIsrael accused Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat of "encouraging terrorism" and said it was prepared to respond to the bombing -- the third major attack in an Israeli city in a week. \nVice President Dick Cheney said Arafat must "make a 100 percent good-faith effort to put an end to terrorism." \nThe blast next to a shoe shop blew out shop windows, set a store on fire and left victims sprawled on the pavement amid shards of glass, pieces of fruit, shoes and storefront mannequins. \n"It sounded like half the street exploded," said Hama Gidon, a clothing store worker who was slightly injured. "All the mannequins went flying and I did too. People were falling, glass was flying everywhere." \nMore than 100 people were treated on the spot or taken to hospitals, though most suffered only from shock. Three people were seriously hurt and nine had moderate injuries, officials said. \nMark Sokolov, a U.S. citizen from Woodmere, N.Y., who survived the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, was slightly hurt in Sunday's explosion along with his wife and two daughters. \n"I heard a loud whoosh, like a bang, and I kind of saw things flying around a little bit, and then I realized I was able to get up and walk around," Sokolov told Israeli television. \nSokolov said he was on the 38th floor of the World Trade Center's south tower on Sept. 11 when a hijacked airliner hit the north tower. His office was evacuated and he escaped before the south tower was hit. \nNo group immediately claimed responsibility for Sunday's attack, but Israel said it held Arafat ultimately responsible. \nArafat is "encouraging terrorism, he's sending (attackers) to Jerusalem," said Raanan Gissin, a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. "We will continue to systematically dismantle the terrorist infrastructure." \nThe Palestinian leadership, meanwhile, "strongly condemned the suicide attack" and called on President Bush to send Mideast envoy Anthony Zinni back to the region. However, Bush has been sharply critical of Arafat, and Cheney suggested on "Fox News Sunday" that Zinni will not return soon.
(01/23/02 5:37am)
JERUSALEM -- A Palestinian gunman fired on Israelis waiting at a Jerusalem bus stop Tuesday, fatally wounding two people and injuring 14 others. Israeli commandos hours earlier stormed an explosives lab and killed four Islamic militants in the West Bank.\nThe violence provoked outrage and warnings of retaliation on both sides.\nMideast tensions are again surging after several weeks of relative calm, with the Israelis effectively keeping Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat under house arrest at his West Bank government compound, and militant Palestinians abandoning an informal truce.\nThe Israelis said they launched Tuesday's commando raid in the West Bank city of Nablus and other pre-emptive operations because Arafat repeatedly refused to act against militants. They also held Arafat responsible for the shooting attack on one of west Jerusalem's busiest streets.\n"You can certainly expect an Israeli reaction," said Israeli government spokesman Avi Pazner. "Israel has done very little until now. Apparently this was not strong enough medicine and maybe a strong reaction is needed."\nBut Ahmed Abdel Rahman, the Palestinian Cabinet secretary, said Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon "has to blame himself for pushing the Palestinians to react against this continuous aggression."\nIn the Jerusalem shooting, a Palestinian gunman opened fire with an assault rifle on Israelis waiting in the rain for a bus and walking along one of the city's main arteries, Jaffa Street.\nWitness Akiva Harari, 21, said the attacker, wearing a heavy coat, emerged from a parking lot. "I saw him shoot two women and they fell," he said. Police then chased the gunman back into the parking lot, followed by several minutes of sporadic gunfire," Harari said.\n"The terrorist tried to run away, but after a short chase, police succeeded in hitting him and killed him," said Jerusalem police chief Mickey Levy.\nSixteen people were shot. Two women later died of their wounds, while four others remained in serious condition. In addition, more than 20 people were treated for shock, police and rescue workers said.\nThe gunman, Saeed Ramadan, was a member of the Al Aqsa Brigades, which is linked to Arafat's Fatah movement, said the man's uncle, Adnan Ramadan. The shooting was retaliation for last week's killing of an Al Aqsa Brigades' leader, sources in the group said.\n"We are at war," Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert told Israel television after viewing the carnage. "This war is not taking place in some far-off battleground, but is happening here, at home, in shops, restaurants."\nMarwan Kanafani, a spokesman for Arafat, said Tuesday on MSNBC that cycle of violence resulted from the "wicked policy of Sharon" and that the only way to stop the retaliatory attacks was for Sharon to talk to Arafat. Sharon has called Arafat irrelevant.
(01/09/02 4:13am)
JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called Iran the "center of world terror" and said Tuesday a recently captured arms shipment showed that Iran and the Palestinians were collaborating to strike at Israel.\nIsrael said it would soon release documents that show the Palestinian Authority was responsible for the 50 tons of weapons captured by Israeli commandos last Thursday on a cargo ship in the Red Sea. "We have all the evidence and it will unfold, and we will present it soon," Sharon adviser Daniel Ayalon said.\nThe Palestinian Authority insists it had nothing to do with the arms shipment and said its senior security officials would question those accused by Israel of trying to smuggle the weapons.\nWhile Mideast violence has dropped sharply since Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Dec. 16 speech calling for an end to attacks against Israel, the dispute over the weapons-laden ship has kept the two sides exchanging heated words.\nThe weapons included 62 Katyusha rockets that could reach Israeli cities from Palestinian areas in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.\nIn Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher described as "credible" the Israeli allegations that the Palestinians were trying to smuggle the weapons.\n"We have some of the evidence," Boucher said, adding that U.S. diplomats had examined a number of the weapons. "The quantity and quality of these weapons are of serious concern."\nSharon said that if the Palestinians had obtained the weapons, it would have put the country "in an impossible situation where all of Israel becomes hostage to Yasser Arafat."\nA senior Israeli military official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Israel believed Iran sold the weapons to the Palestinians for $10 million -- far below their actual worth -- in hopes it would allow Iran to threaten Israel by proxy.\nAt a meeting Sunday, Israel demanded the Palestinian Authority punish those involved in the shipment. U.S. envoy Anthony Zinni was present at the meeting, the Israeli military official said.\nIsrael has accused Arafat himself of direct involvement in the arms shipment, saying an operation of this magnitude, involving millions of dollars worth of rockets, rifles and anti-tank missiles, could not have taken place without the approval of Arafat, head of the Palestinian Authority.\n"The great danger (to Israel) are those relations that were developed between the Palestinian Authority and Iran," Sharon told some 200 visiting American Jewish leaders. "Iran at the present time is the center of world terror."\nIran has denied involvement with the weapons shipment. Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi, speaking Monday on Iranian television, said Israel was making the allegations to "intensify a crackdown on the Palestinian intefadeh," or uprising.\nThe Palestinian Authority has acknowledged that the Palestinian captain of the weapons ship, the Karine A, is in its naval unit, but has denied links to the shipment.\n"The Palestinian Authority is not interested and does not want any form of escalation in this situation," Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo told a news conference.\nBut Palestinian naval captain Omar Akawi said in prison interviews Monday that he picked up the weapons off the coast of Iran and received his instructions from Adel Awadallah, also known as Adel Mughrabi and identified by Israel as a major weapons buyer in the Palestinian Authority.\nAsked about the statements by the ship captain, Abed Rabbo said, "there are so many holes and loopholes in what he declared."\nSharon said that Israel had kept the Americans fully informed.\n"They know exactly that millions and millions of dollars were spent by the Palestinian Authority and things like that are not done without the direct approval of Arafat," Sharon said.\nThe United States has for years cited Iran as a sponsor of international terrorism. But during the current U.S. military campaign, the United States and Iran have shared an interest in seeing the destruction of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and have managed to avoid any direct confrontations.\nDespite distrust heightened by the smuggling allegations, security officials from both sides were still holding meetings in the hopes of working out a truce to end 15 months of violence. The Israeli security source said the sides promised Zinni to try to reach a detailed document on implementing a full truce before Zinni returns Jan. 18.\nIsrael says the Palestinians purchased the Karine A last year in order to smuggle the weapons.\nLloyd's Register, which tracks ship ownership worldwide, said the Karine A was sold last Aug. 31 by the Lebanese company Diana K to an unknown buyer. The ship is now registered in Tonga, but the owner is not available, according to Chris Owens, the registrar of ships for Lloyd's.
(11/12/01 4:31am)
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Osama bin Laden said he had nothing to do with the anthrax attacks in the United States, and declared he would never allow himself to be captured, in the second part of a newspaper interview published Sunday. \n"America can't get me alive," bin Laden was quoted as saying. "I can be eliminated, but not my mission." \nBin Laden granted the interview Wednesday to Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir, who said he was blindfolded and bundled into a jeep in the Afghan capital, Kabul. He said he was driven five hours to a cold, mud hut where he spoke with bin Laden for two hours. \nIt was impossible to independently verify Mir's account of the interview. \nMir's newspaper, Ausaf, published part of the interview Saturday and included additional excerpts Sunday. Mir, who has written a biography of bin Laden that will be published soon, said the terror suspect declined to answer many of his questions. \nWhen Mir asked if bin Laden was responsible for the anthrax attacks, he laughed and said: "We don't know anything about anthrax." \nBin Laden did claim in the portion of the interview published Saturday that his al-Qaeda organization had nuclear and chemical weapons and would use them if the United States employed such weapons on him. \nMir wrote that when he asked bin Laden where he allegedly got the mass destruction weapons, bin Laden replied: "Go to the next question." \nThe United States says it has no evidence that bin Laden possesses nuclear weapons. Intelligence experts believe al-Qaeda has experimented with crude chemical weapons at a training camp in Afghanistan. \nFBI officials say there is no direct link between anthrax attacks in the United States and any cell or network, including al-Qaeda. \nMir said bin Laden vowed that if his Taliban allies lose Kabul and other cities, "we will move to the mountains. We will continue our guerrilla warfare against the Americans"